Washington, DC- Nancy Keenan, the president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, joined Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NY) and Representative Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) at a Capitol Hill news conference to introduce legislation to stop pharmacies from denying the sale of safe, legally prescribed medications.

In response to a growing movement by anti-choice pharmacists to deny women their doctor-prescribed birth control, the bipartisan Access to Legal Pharmaceuticals Act (ALPhA) would ensure that pharmacies will fill all prescriptions, even if a different pharmacist has to do it. Rep. Chris Shays of Connecticut is the bipartisan bill’s chief Republican cosponsor.

NARAL Pro-Choice America, the nation’s leading advocacy organization for personal privacy and a woman’s right to choose, launched a campaign two weeks ago in which nearly 200,000 activists from around the country have sent petitions to the five largest retail pharmacy chains asking them to protect women’s access to birth control.

"Senator Lautenberg and Representatives Maloney and Shays are standing up for common sense and personal responsibility against the growing movement urging pharmacists to impose far-right ideology on American women. It ought to be simple: walk into a pharmacy with a birth control prescription and walk out with birth control -- without intimidation, without inconvenience, and without delay. Pharmacies have an ethical and legal obligation not to endanger women's health by withholding basic health care. Like most Americans, Senator Lautenberg and Representatives Maloney and Shays understand that personal responsibility and timely access to birth control prevents unintended pregnancies and therefore reduces the need for abortion," said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America.

Keenan said it was essential for Congress to push to protect women’s access to basic health care since legislators in 10 states were considering bills that would permit pharmacists to refuse to fill women’s birth control prescriptions.

ALPhA was introduced today in the Senate by Sen. Lautenberg and in the House by Reps. Maloney (D-NY), Rep. Shays (R-CT), Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (D-FL) and Joe Crowley (D-NY).